Tampa’s first air-conditioned building opened nearly a century ago: ‘That wasn’t even in our minds’

TAMPA, Fla. - Living without air conditioning during the dead of summer in Tampa may seem unfathomable, but it was the reality for Tampanians a century ago. 

Can you imagine living in Florida before air conditioning? In the old Cigar City people first cooled off at the movies.

"Tampa Theatre actually opened with air conditioning in 1926 which made us the first commercially air-conditioned building in Tampa. In fact, the headlines at the time said come feel the man made air," said Jill Witecki, director of marketing.

And the mechanical descendants of that first A/C system in the bowels of the old theater still chug along as do many who remember life pre-A/C.

Parts of the old A/C system are still in theatre.

"Ain’t nobody know nothing about no air conditioning. Air conditioning-that wasn’t even in our minds," shared Barbara Edwards, a long-time Tampa resident in her 80s.

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"We had to sleep with the windows open. Eventually, we got fans, but not at first," shared 64-year-old Mary Clark.

A newspaper ad touts places that had air conditioning. 

Old newspapers contain ads by businesses touting their cool air. Air conditioning wasn’t in widespread use in the Tampa area until the early 1960s. But years earlier, they threw a party at the Columbia Restaurant in Ybor City. Air conditioning had been installed by Andrea Gonzmart’s great-grandfather.

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"He had a dream of bringing A/C to his diners," shared Gonzmart. "So, in 1935 that dream came alive, and it was the first air-conditioned dining room in the City of Tampa."

The Columbia Restaurant was the first dining room in the aera to have air conditioning. 

All these years later they’ve just installed a new A/C system at the Columbia. It’s clean and energy efficient, a top-of-the-line system. 

It will generate plenty of cool air, but it won’t generate nearly the excitement as those first air conditioners that brought cool to a hot city.